Running Away
by Anda chan
Summary: [Glühen timeline - RanKen] Goodbyes are anything but easy...this one is especially heartbreaking but maybe there's a way out of it?


Disclaimer: A season later, I still don't own Weiß and man, I do wish I was making money off of this. Lyrics © Hoobastank, so I don't own them either.

Warnings: If you haven't watched Glühen, or at least the last episode you might not wanna read this. It's got a few spoilers. Okay, it's got more than a few spoilers, it deals with the major theme of episode 13 of Glühen but only with a bit of my own little twisted idea of what should have really happened. ^^; So there are spoilers, a bit of language and shounen-ai. But what else is new? Oh and yes, I didn't have the heart to write them using the new character designs, so don't point out to me that the descriptions are off. I know they are.

Notes: Call it a songfic if you will, it's just a what if-like fic with lyrics that fit way too damn nicely stuck into it. Not like I'm basing it off the lyrics (which by the way, are in italics) in order to write something. So yes. Ano… without any further ado. I think I'll hush up now and let you read.

**Running Away**

_by: Andariel_

_i don't want you to give it all up and leave your own life collecting dust_

The ambient noise of the airport was deafening as at the same time too silent for the quaking turmoil that was driving him beyond the madness he had gathered throughout the years. It was too much, the thought that just now that things had come to an end; that the blood had stopped flowing, splashing upon twisted grins and white clothes. The torture had stopped and yet it had just only began. Glazed cyan eyes shifted, hiding themselves behind fluttering lids that could not keep still; orbs glancing away from the statue-like figure that stood before him. That endless coldness that he knew was but an act, the endless coldness he knew was not that endless after all. He knew…oh, he knew but was not able to let himself sink closer, to inch closer and explore the ice, to part it like broken pieces of a glacier floating about in the endless blue of the ocean. He did not have the strength to do this, and yet…and yet he had come here in hopes that maybe, just maybe he would be able to do something. 

_why are you running away_

Ken swallowed dryly, biting his lower lip and keeping the threatening tears in check, fists clenching and unclenching at his sides as the wheels of his mind turned round and round on a loophole. One side telling him to just open his damn mouth and say something, the other deadly silent and fearful. Unfortunately it was the latter that was coming forth as the dominant emotion. Gods, how he wanted to scream out, to plead desperately, to fall to his knees even-anything that would keep him from saying goodbye. Anything but goodbye. He would not be able to do this even though he knew better than everyone else that once Aya had set his mind to something, he would go through with it no matter what happened in the meantime. But-but maybe this time it was different. Fuck! He could not just let that stoic piece of ice fly off across the goddamn globe to wander some unknown streets of some random city and meet some kind of unexpected, fucked up end. Okay, now he was being paranoid, but was he not allowed to? After the five years they had spent together in this twisted kind of family they had, was it that strange for him not to want this to happen?

_you never gave us a chance to be_

But maybe he was just being delusional. It sure had happened more than once in the course of the last few months, so why not now? Yet…the least five years of… of what? Fighting together? Killing together? Putting up a show of pure innocence before hundreds of teenaged girls that ran from the shop every time that deep voice shouted firmly with the ultimatum of buying or leaving. The life of killers, of outlaws that did not even have a life of their own, as it had been stolen or abandoned for their own reasons. A life of rebels, like _shihi_, fighting for what they believed was right even if the consequences were that of endless bloodshed. How many wrongs had they fixed already? Were they not allowed to fix their own wrongs? To go about setting their own lives on track? And that was just what was happening now, wasn't it? That was why Aya was heading off, splitting from everyone now that his true chance was here. But what about him? What about Ken…what'd happen with his warped life that had taken a long turn somewhere down the road, to get him seeing and hearing things he could not even quite fathom? 

_and i don't want you to feel sorry for me  
and i don't want you to be by my side to tell me everything's alright  
i just want you to tell me the truth  


you know i'd do that for you

_

"Aya…" he began to say, gaze rising slowly to look at the redhead, who had already turned without a single word toward him, nor goodbye nor anything what so ever. His tan trench coat flapping smoothly around his ankles with each graceful step. He did not stop as if not hearing his name being uttered so softly from subtly trembling lips. Ken held a hand out in desperate panic; nothing but air was caught by his reaching fingers.

_cause i did enough to show you that i was willing to give and sacrifice_

He was leaving. He was actually fucking leaving! Although his body did not seem to want to move, his mind screamed loudly enough to get him to react. Which he did. "Matte!!" the plead escaped his lips with a shattering scream that caused not only Aya but also the nearest people to pause and look at him. Although the redheaded did not turn, not at first. Ken could care less about the dozens of eyes that looked upon him at the moment, could care less about the whisperings that came and went before gradually, much too slowly people started to move again. But silence still reigned however, in the general vicinity, for a few moments as onlookers looked between the two. First at Ken, then Aya and back. 

_and i was the one who was lifting you up when you thought your life had had enough_

"Aya…" Ken called out quietly once again, those unchecked tears glazing his cyan colored eyes as he watched the other's unmoving back. No, wait, there was the slightest of movements. Just a bit, really but it was there, it was noticeable. Ken saw it from the few meters distance that had come between them; the few meters that felt like endless kilometers of an endless tunnel of sorts between them, stretching out for infinity, taunting, teasing, scaring the hell out of him as a little voice in the back of his mind kept telling him that this was futile, that nothing would ever change, that although the promise had been made that Aya would return, Ken still did not want to have to wait however long it would take for him to look into those embed amethysts once again. 

He took a step forward toward the older man, hesitantly approaching in order to convince. To plead. To do anything he could to just make this not happen. Maybe if he could delay him enough to miss his flight. Maybe…maybe then something could work. Something could be accomplished. Maybe then this despairing feeling that was tearing him apart from the inside. "Kudasai…" his voice cracked, even as it barely rose above a pitiful whisper. But he was close enough for the older man to hear him, which he did. Aya neither moved nor responded, merely not acknowledging the plead until Ken touched his upper arm lightly, hesitantly. 

_and when i get close you turn away_

"Don't." was the only reply emerging from the redhead, but it wasn't a cold, sharp answer as Ken expected it to be. It was, in fact, much of a request in its own way. But there was more. Now, Ken wasn't the best at reading people and certainly not Aya who allowed no one to get close enough to even catch the slightest of hints as to what kind of emotions swirled beneath that icy mask of his. But this time he knew, something told him, that somehow he was getting to him. 

"Don't what…?" He began, feeling something rise up within him, giving him the fuel to go on, to do something he wanted to do for once. "Is it wrong of me to ask you not to leave? Is it that wrong to care? Is it that selfish of me not to want to lose you?" The words escaped him unchecked, like a flood gate that had just been opened and whose mechanism had broken, worn away and washed out with the rushing waters never to be fixed again.

_there's nothing i can do or say  
so i need you to tell me the truth  
you know i'd do that for you_

"Say something, god damnit!" Patience was lost. He knew it wouldn't do him any good, but it had always been this way when dealing with Aya. It had always been like this, always ended in some sort of shouted argument that would lead to either party turning their back and walking away but he would not do that now. Not now. Not this time. Not when he knew this was the last chance he had at… at what? At something. He had realized months if not years ago that his feelings toward the walking glacier before him were more than friendship or loyalty under a common goal. He wasn't that much of a prude to realize that there was more to it. Whether Aya returned those feelings or not was another story, but he could deal without them. He could deal as long as he was close by. As long as there was that sharp voice to yell at him or those glaring amethysts he could so easily lose himself within. 

_ is it me? is it you?  
nothing that i can do to make you change your mind _

"I have to go."

_ is it me? is it you?  
nothing that I can do. is it a waste of time?_

"No."

"Ken…"

"No! You selfish prick, you're not running away!"

It was then that those narrowed amethysts turned on him as Aya looked over his shoulder, that slender body rotating ever slightly to allow him the movement. Ken looked on defiantly, yet in an endless attempt to control his screaming emotions. He would overcome this. He would do this. He would not lose. He would not back down. 

"I cannot stay here." A weak excuse, one that barely even matched the icyness in those violet gems that shifted momentarily to the flight screen as a faint announcement was heard: the last boarding call for his flight.

It was now or never, Ken realized. And thus, reached out, turning Aya around completely, fingers twisting into the material of his long coat. A shaky breath escaped his gritted teeth as he looked up the few centimeter difference there was between them. "I will not let you throw your life away."

Aya was a statue, unmoving, unreacting as always. On the outside, at least. "There is nothing for me here."

_so why are you running away?_

"Does your sister suddenly mean nothing to you?" Ken spat out bitterly, knowing inwardly that this was not the best choice of words, but he needed something that would get through that icy façade. 

Those amethyst eyes narrowed dangerously at the expertly aimed question. Just as Ken knew they would. How many times had he watched that same reaction, but never this close… never to this intoxicating proximity. Never on this level that he could actually feel the twitching of muscles beneath Aya's clothes; the shivering caused by his desperate fight for control. "Don't you da--" 

"Do _I_ suddenly mean nothing to you… Aya?" Ken interrupted the possible death threat that had been coming his way. At this point he hardly cared for the onlookers that passed by or the ones that paused for a moment or two in their curiosity to listen in on what was going on. At this point nothing else existed but them two; all the previously deafening surroundings had merely vanished in the blink of an eye, leaving him alone – as alone as he felt before that piercing gaze. That beautiful, unnatural gaze that held so much more than anyone gave him credit for. 

_what is it i have to say to make you admit you're afraid? _

"I--…" 

It wasn't everyday that Aya stumbled over his words or even did not know what to say, but not even this astonished Ken at the moment. He wanted an answer, whatever it might be. A shove or a yell would do right about now. Anything to end the silence. Anything that would give him a justification as to what he as doing was pure foolishness. Of course, there was always the hope that just maybe it wasn't all that foolish. But that would not happen, he knew. Wistful thinking kept him alive, however. 

A slender hand rose slowly, pallid fingers contrasting against the tanned flesh of Ken's face. The younger man swallowed, cyan eyes widening ever slightly despite his efforts to stay as calm as he possibly could. He watched as those usually pursed lips parted ever slightly as if to speak, but no words escaped them. He heard the dull sound of a suitcase hitting the floor; Aya had let go of it in order to reach up with his other hand as well; fingers sliding into dark brown stands of his hair. The silence was agonizing. It was killing him. He wanted an answer. Wanted to be pushed away, even. Expected it! But it just wasn't coming. Aya was torturing him, sure, and at the same time making every last bit of sanity in him break apart mercilessly, leaving him lost and cold and alone. 'The bastard,' Ken thought to himself, swallowing dryly and trying not to turn away from that solemn, unreadable look. But he found it impossible. Possibly because those embed amethysts were getting closer and at the same time behind hidden behind slowly closing lids. 

Time itself was slowing down for some unknown reason Ken did not quite understand. But at the same time, it sped up to an almost unbearable motion that hit him dead on, nearly knocking him off his feet as those soft lips pressed against his. Warmth. Implausible warmth flooded him, causing violent chills to race down his spine, making the fingers that previously clung onto that light colored coat now ease up in surprise; in pleasant shock. The very thing he wanted; the very thing he convinced himself of not hoping for… here it was. A light movement of soft, warm lips against his own. A seductive expert dance that caused ever muscle in his body to relax at once, to make his heart skip a few beats at the time, which he knew was surely not healthy but the thought did not even cross his mind. In fact, there were no thoughts in that warped mine of his right then and there. There as just… extreme serenity – something he had not felt in years. 

And then he tasted something other than what those lips had to offer, other than that taste of Aya that he could not even describe: a cool saltiness of a tear he knew at once to be his own. 

In the far back of his mind he heard the faint purring of airplane engines but it was too far away to focus completely on. Too far away from this bubble he had built around himself and the extremely warm, malleable body he rested so tightly against in a desperate embrace he never wanted to let go of. 

_why are you running away?_

~*~ Owari ~*~ 

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Mrr… not much to say about this now that it's done. It did start out as one thing and ended a bit differently than what I had envisioned but I'm still quite content with it. ^^; Comments anyone?


End file.
